Going Cross-Faction

Here at Privateer Press we have noticed a tendency among our Monsterpocalypse players to build forces out of the same faction game after game and set after set. While players may find that experience more immersive, I would contend that they are missing out on a world of opportunities for some great play experiences. Experimenting with factions outside your agenda is not just something to try once—it provides opportunities to fill in weak spots in your strategy as well as giving you a few tricks your opponent might not see coming. Below are some of my favorite cross-faction options.

Not all factions have the ability to crank out tons of power dice like the Martian Menace does. More than once, when playing a monster light on power dice, I would take a Saucer along with a few Power Pods to drop on power zones around the map, to take advantage of their power die–doubling Amplify ability. The Cargo/Transport option between the Power Pods and the Saucer mitigates the cross-faction penalty and more than pays for itself when it is time to power up. Just having two extra Power Pods on the table can pay off big time, with 4 power dice. You can do a lot with 4 extra power dice! While you are running with a Saucer, you might also want to consider a Nullifier Pod; placing some Mire on the board can throw a wrench into your opponent’s unit strategy, as they have to calculate alternate routes around the little guy.

Sometimes eliminating buildings and hazards from the map can play directly into your monster’s strengths. Monsters with lower health and the ability to do super damage in both their forms can really benefit from a lack of collision-based damage on the map. For this reason, units like the Bellower, the Spitter and the new Spadefin Skimmer from Series 4 are worthy of your cross-faction consideration, since they all have the hazard-removing ability Extinguish. A well-timed use of Extinguish before your monster gets body slammed into a hazard can be just as valuable as regaining health.

Series 3’s Spikasaur and Series 4’s Razor Beetle are units worth taking no matter what faction you are playing. The ability to place a wandering hazard on the map for extra damage wherever you want it cannot be ignored. Couple this with the fact that Hazardous can add damage to a collision on top of the damage delivered from a hazard and even a building, and the damage starts to add up quickly.

As games of Monsterpocalypse wind down, sometimes finding a hazard to throw your opponent into can be tricky. Some forces using more delicate monsters prefer to run lean on the hazards. And with hazard-removing effects like stomp and Extinguish, after all the buildings are destroyed, all the hazards can be vanquished as well. This plays out well for some monsters, but not all. In Monsterpocalypse Now we are introducing the Fire Kami. This unit features the Ignite ability, which allows you to turn rubble tiles over to their hazard side. This allows you to put some extra damage on the map in the late game so you can keep the pressure on your opponent.

As players become more savvy, they are beginning to take more and more back-to-back monster activations. One of the ways to counter this is to perform more combined attacks headed up by a unit with a trigger that denies action or power dice like Energy Sap or Power Drain. Going with the Bellower, Chomper, or the new Mollok Mortar will help reduce your opponent’s dice resources.

As other players in your local environment fall into predictable patters, sometimes you need to throw out something that moves them out of those patterns. For instance, a player who has become too dependent on granting abilities from one figure to another might be a reason to include a Corrupter in your force. Having the ability Jam shadow a monster like Zorog or Sky Sentinel can really put a crimp in his unit strategies. Further, if you find that your opponents are becoming dependent on combined units attacks, by piling up +1 boost die bonuses from Banks or from abilities like High Impact, you might want to consider running a Squix in your force. Just one Squix with its Distract ability can rob every figure within 2 spaces of 1 boost die each, which usually means you are robbing your opponent of a total of 3–4 boost dice.

Then there are those units that just kick so much butt you cannot pass them up. Consider the Ctulabite, the Spikasaur, or the new Airborne Ape from Series 4. Running just one of these units to head up your combined attacks gives you access to a unit-clearing ability like Multi-Shot, Explosion, or Radial Attack.

When you sit down to build an army, a deck, or a force for a collectible game, the more options you have at your disposal, the better your army, deck, or force can perform—assuming, of course, you choose elements that perform well together and work with your play style. Don’t limit yourself by staying with just one faction; get out there and explore different play options. Surely there are even more nasty combinations you guys can come up with.

That being said, here is a little offer for you guys; let’s have a contest. Email me your most awesome cross-faction force list that you can come up with. Do a little write up as to why the list is more awesome than anything else I will be receiving, and make sure you point out those combos! If I choose your list as the most awesome cross-faction list, I will send you something special from the prize vault – I think we have some Megas back there that have not been released yet. Make sure you include your Name, Address, and Phone Number along with your write up. Email those submission to yaple@privateerpress.com before Monday November 16th, 2009 for a chance to win. I will post the winner’s name and force list on this blog that following week.

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The New Buildings and Hazards in ‘Monsterpocalypse Now’

Like Monsterpocalypse: Rise, Monsterpocalypse Now introduces nine new buildings to add to your city. Among these new buildings are some new abilities, two new hazards, and the new green abilities.

First let me explain the green abilities again, in case you missed the previous posts. Green abilities are placed exclusively on buildings. They can be any ability from Monsterpocalypse that works with units, monsters, or both—they are just printed in green. When a building has a green ability, the building itself does not have the power described in the ability; if you are securing the building, though, all the figures in your force—regardless of agenda or faction!—gain that power. Basically, this allows us to make abilities like Radar Network (which grants Radar to your units) without making a whole new ability. In fact, in the future you may see a building with green Radar instead of Radar Network.

Every self-respecting city has an outlet of state-controlled media through which it can inform its population that “there is nothing to worry about.” With the release of Series 4, the Newspaper Office is available for your Monsterpocalypse cities. Although newspapers may not be turning a profit these days, they are tapped into the wire services and have many reporters on the ground to scoop the story of the day from their competition. Thus, this 4 Defense, 3 Energy building features the new ability Intel along with Blazing Inferno (after all, it’s filled with stacks of paper).

INTEL—If you are securing this building, adjacent allied units can advance without spending A-Dice.

Not every city is powered with clean, safe nuclear energy. Due to fears of nuclear meltdowns and misunderstandings regarding the incident at Three Mile Island, most cities run their power grids with giant electrical turbines powered by burning oil, coal, and other fuels. Thus we bring you the Electrical Power Plant—and all the rolling brownouts that accompany it. This new 4 Defense, 5 Energy building allows us to bring back the Industrial and Power Amplifier abilities, along with a new reaction: Live Wire.

LIVE WIRE—When this building is destroyed, monsters on or adjacent to its foundation suffer 1 damage.

The idea for the Posh Apartments came to me while humming the theme from Diff’rent Strokes. To which you may say, “What’choo talkin’ ’bout, Erik?” Well, I am talking about a 5 Defense, 3 Energy building with Discount, High Occupancy, and Defenseless. But because it is posh, it features a nice point at the top of the building. This pointed top grants the building Spire, but the figure has no other hazard.

No trip to the big city would be complete without an overnight stay at a fancy hotel downtown. This 4 Defense, 3 Energy tower of leisure and pleasure comes with High Occupancy and Spire, just like the Posh Apartments. Inspired by all the underground loading bays I have seen at hotels (having worked many a convention and traveled into the bowels of many hotels), I gave the hotel Underground Network.

Within the last seven years I have lived in three different states, in three different metropolitan areas. It seems that on one level or another, every city has some form of publishing business within their city limits (and I am not just talking about game publishing). Despite great advancements in electronic technology, it seems that people still like to entertain themselves with tangible items, such as a book or a collectible miniatures game. So when brainstorming new buildings for Monsterpocalypse Now, one of the first on my list was the Publishing House. Since books are the keepers of history, I used this as a chance to bring Media Hub back to the game. Further, being that most publishers are pretty benign people, the building has Defenseless. I also reasoned that if publishers were really doing their job, people would have a bunch of books in their hands rather than guns—thus the inclusion of green Disarm. Finally, because every press check I have gone on has assaulted my nose with the foul smell of chemicals, I gave this building the new Chemical Spill ability, which creates a chemical hazard.

CHEMICAL SPILL—If this building is hit or destroyed, replace it with a chemical hazard. Figures moving onto that hazard take 1 damage. Mechanical monsters at full health do not suffer this damage.

Anyone who grew up in the late 80s to early 90s will remember a time when heavy metal music was a threat to the development of children. Tipper Gore (Al Gore’s wife) led a campaign against musicians and their producers to bring about sanctions on this music. The TV preachers of the time were up in arms, proclaiming the music “satanic.” The Music Producer in Monsterpocalypse Now is based on those times. While this 3 Defense, 2 Energy building is rather simple, it may prove to be one of the more valuable buildings to include in your city. The building features green Distract (because everyone is yelling, “Turn that thing down!”). Of course, any Lords of Cthul player will tell you that having a few units with Distract around the map is a great tool for peeling multiple boost dice off the combined attacks (up to –1 boost die for each unit in that attack, possibly) and can put a dent in a monster’s attempt to take multiple back-to-back monster activations, if they have to make up the lost boost die with an action die. Because that rock music is so “evil,” this building also debuts the arrival of the Hellfont ability and its hazard, which should get some players to dig out some of their Lords of Cthul, no matter what faction they currently play.

HELLFONT—If this building is hit or destroyed, replace it with a hellfont hazard. Once each unit activation, the active player can use 1 unoccupied space of the hellfont hazard to spawn an Occult unit.

When I think about some of the great cities I have been to, one of the first things that comes to mind are the huge churches. In a way, the churches of a city reflect its cultural heritage. The Cathedral was one of the first buildings I put on the list of new buildings. It seems that most of the great churches in the world have one thing in common: a big, pointy top. Thus, this 4 Defense, 1 Energy building was given Spire, although it has no additional hazard. To reinforce its spiritual theme, I gave it green Super Strength; because of its hearty construction, it got Super Structure. I also wanted this building to stick in the craw of the Lord of Cthul but still be generally useful against most monsters. So I addressed one of the Lords of Cthul’s main strategies, regaining health, and created the Holy Ground skill.

HOLY GROUND—Monsters within 2 spaces of this building cannot restore health.

Every day on the way to work, I pass construction sites in Bellevue. Every day I see giant cranes affixed to the sides of incomplete buildings, making minimal progress. I have been making that trip to work for nearly two years now. The Empire State building was built in 410 days, so I am not sure what is taking these guys so long. These never-ending projects of progress are a part of every city around the world, so we bring you the Construction Site. This 3 Defense, 1 Energy industrial site features the second appearance of Chemical Spill, along with two new abilities. The first of these, Hoist, is an action that allows you to move units from one side of the figure to the other—in this case using a giant crane to move the little guys. Having worked on a few of my uncles’ construction sites, I can tell you that they are usually littered with all sorts of tools and raw materials that could be used as a weapon by a 60-meter-tall monster—so we also gave this location Fortified.

HOIST—Choose 1 unit within 2 spaces of this figure and place that unit in another space it could legally occupy within 2 spaces of this figure.

FORTIFIED—If you are securing this building, allied units within 2 spaces of it gain +1 brawl B-Die.

If there is one thing that brings a city together, it is the city’s sports teams. What would New York be without the Yankees, Denver without the Broncos, Boston without the Red Sox, or Los Angeles without the Raiders and Rams (zing!) . . . or the Lakers? Because the Sports Arena is a place where masses of people gather, it seemed proper to put High Occupancy on this 6 Defense, 4 Energy building. Inspired by the soccer mobs of England, I also gave it green Energy Drain on the brawl and Fortified, which will both really help with the brawl attacks around this building.

Choosing the right set of buildings is critical in Monsterpocalypse. As many of you have learned, including a variety of buildings to counter tactics you might come across can really pay off, when compared to loading up on just three buildings en masse. The main trick will be to get build a city with 9–12 buildings with only a few duplicates of those key buildings that make your forces sing. So get out there, build a new city, and then tear it all down.

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Savage Swarm

Another staple of the kaiju genre is the giant bug—we all know the classics. An immutable law of science fiction seems to be that exposure to radioactive waste will cause any living organism to grow larger, stronger, and more aggressive. Put that together with some of the cooler-looking aspects of the insect kingdom and increase their size to Monsterpocalypse scale, and you have our newest Destroyer faction: Savage Swarm.

Man’s fear of insects harkens back to our earliest days. Tales of locusts laying waste to entire civilizations go all the way back to the time of Moses, while National Geographic has brought us images of army ants in South America dismantling whole mammals to feed their colonies. Bugs are much smaller than us, but deep down we have a healthy fear of them. Making them monster-sized only magnifies that fear.

The world of kung fu via Hollywood has done a lot for the reputation of the predatory praying mantis. The mantis is pretty scary to begin with; I once saw one eat a freakin’ mouse! But in personifying the praying mantis into Mantacon, I thought back to kung fu movies of years past. In his alpha form, Mantacon is a straight-up brawler (7 Speed, 7 Defense, 7★3 Brawl, 5★2 Power, 5 Health, Jump, brawl Lightning Attack, brawl Hit and Run, and red Cloak). To compensate for his weaker power stat and lack of a blast attack, Mantacon scores Lightning Attack in his alpha form. Further, his Cloak means that enemy monsters will need to get closer if they want to engage him, which means he will get to use that Lightning Attack without having to run across the map. This, of course, represents the camouflage abilities of the real praying mantis. In his ultra form, Mantacon trades in his Lightning Attack for Chain Attack, his Hit and Run moves over to the power attack, and he becomes more “power attack–centric.” This makes Mantacon a true kung fu master of the play mat!

Growing up, we all learned about how a fly regurgitates digestive fluids onto his meal, then sucks it all up together to consume it. Mucustos is a tip of the hat to all that is disgusting in the world of bugs: snail slime, grub guts, and fly puke. This tubby tower of mucus focuses on the blast attack, which represents him spitting a stream of icky-sticky goo all over his opponents from long range. While he’s in his alpha form (Crunch and Energy Sap on the blast), this acidic bile really takes a lot out of the target while smaller members of the swarm crawl out from the folds around his belly (Summon). In his ultra form, the hive mind kicks in as he gains blue Radar, but his printed range drops to short range. Further, he picks up Extinguish as he turns his attention toward putting out hazards with his spew. While neither of his forms are very maneuverable (5 Speed), he does maintain a 6 Defense in both forms and a total of 13 Health—which is not too shabby for a purple puke factory.

Savage Swarm features some keen utility units some folks might consider crossing factions for. Most notably is the Spy Fly. This nasty little gnat features 5 Speed, 2 Defense, Flight, Spotter, and Quick. This means for a cost of 1, you get a unit that can move for free (which makes it a great unit to screen with) and also sports Spotter (which makes it one of Mucustos’ best friends). Further, it runs well with the Cliff Hoppers. With 1★1 Blast, Power Gorge on the blast, Flying, 6 Speed, and short range, the Cliff Hoppers are the backbone of the Swarm’s blast attack units.

Another nugget of awesome offered up by Savage Swarm is the Razor Beetle. This giant horned beetle is a brawling bug with Burrow and Blitz and a hefty Brawl of 3. What’s more, that horn is real painful to step on, so we gave this unit Hazardous. The Steelback Roach rounds out the collective. This simple 5 Speed unit has a meager 1 Brawl, but its usefulness is in its red Shelter and red Force Field, which can grant all your adjacent units +1 Defense against blast and brawl attacks. The Roach also has red Pathfinder to help your monsters and units cut through any screening you might encounter.

Savage Swarm and the Planet Eaters have a lot to offer one another. Without hesitation, I think it is safe to say that Rogzor will become fast friends with the Cliff Hoppers. Their boost dice will be welcome, and with the addition of a Radar Array they will be right up there with a Belcher. The big guys will also be happy to add the Spy Fly to their team. With its Dig In, the 4 Defense of a Crawler would kick up to an effective 6 when paired with the Steelback Roach, meaning if you want to get the Crawler off an objective, its best to start by taking out the Roach first. In this way the Roach acts almost as a Meat Slave: you will need to make two attacks to clear a power zone. As with the Razorback Beetle and its Hazardous ability, every monster can make use of units like Explodohawks for their big one-shot damage and Constrictors for their Halt ability. Savage Swarm and Planet Eaters together offer a nice amount of utility as well as complementary abilities that can add variety to the monsters’ play styles.

Savage Swarm actually feels a lot like the Planet Eaters in play. The monsters do their thing and generally work well with a variety of different units. That all adds up to flexibility—and flexibility is always a good thing.

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Quantum Forms

Today we bring you one of the biggest changes to Monsterpocalypse since Series 3: All Your Base introduced the morphers: quantum forms! Quantum forms are a similar concept to a mega form in that you can choose to use one instead of your ultra form when playing. However, they provide a totally different experience and bring something new and special to the game.

In designing the quantums, we wanted them to be more than just alternate mega forms. We wanted promos that not only performed differently in the game but also presented a unique take on the monsters, in both their visuals and their background.

What we decided on are thematic variations between different quantum forms. Some are themed around exposure to toxic waste, while others (like Quantum King Kondo) have been ripped from another time, place, or dimension into the current battle. Still other themes will be developed in the future.

You can identify a quantum form by its “Quantum” title as well as a red hyper stat and one or more red stats in the stat bar on the left of its base. Additionally, each carries the Toxic or Temporal Displacement skill or some other similar new skill. As you might expect, the red hyper stat and the red stats in the stat bar work together. The rules for quantum forms are as follows:

• While your quantum monster has more than 5 power dice in his power pool, stats printed in red in his stat bar increase by the value of his hyper stat. (That stat is also printed in red for easy reference.) This bonus lasts until the end of an attack even if the number of your power dice becomes 5 or less during that attack due to an effect or you spending dice. If your quantum form’s range is printed in red, while he has more than 5 power dice you can increase his range by a number of spaces equal to his hyper stat.

We wanted to play off the power dice you have and give you something to work toward as well as provide an out for your opponent. We also wanted to keep the break point at the same place as for the Overload ability to avoid any confusion. This makes Overload a nice ability to have when your opponent is playing with a quantum form!

Quantum King Kondo is the first quantum form to be released. He features a red Speed 7 along with 2 boost dice on his red power stat. He also has Hyper 2. This means while in his hyper form and he has 6–10 power dice, his speed is increased to 9 and the boost dice on his power stat are increased to 4. Quantum King Kondo also has the Temporal Displacement ability:

• TEMPORAL DISPLACEMENT—At the start of your hyper phase, lose 1 P-Die. If you do, this monster’s attacks do super damage this turn.

You will notice that this works against the opportunity cost for gaining the quantum bonuses (building up to 6 power dice). Most of these quantum skills will have a catch to them and make you work for those bonuses, which provides some interesting challenges for play as your power dice will be slowly bled off. You can still do the super damage from Temporal Displacement even if you don’t have 6–10 power dice, though, as long as you bled off one of your power dice that turn.

With abilities like this, the quantum forms are fun and interesting to play and will provide a slight twist on the experience of Monsterpocalypse for both players. If your opponent is fielding quantum figures, it may be worth taking another look at some of the units and monsters with abilities like Power Drain and Siphon—not to mention the forthcoming Power Strike (but we will tell you about that later when we get to the moles).

So how do you get a Quantum King Kondo? Well, in every Series 4: Monsterpocalypse Now launch kit, retailers will receive two of them. We are encouraging retailers to use these quantum forms as prizes for Organized Play events. The more launch kits a retailer purchases, the more quantum figures they will receive, so your own friendly local game store might even have more than two! If you haven’t heard about them, we encourage you to pester your LGS to get themselves some Series 4 launch kits and use the Quantum King Kondos as Organized Play prizes so you can have a shot at getting a quantum form of your own!

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Subterran Uprising

“Mole monsters” were one of the first additional factions discussed when I came to Privateer Press in March of 2008. When I thought of mole monsters at that time, I pictured something kind of sad, actually—the images in my head were of sunlight-deprived, emaciated, saggy-skinned beasts that would inspire more pity than fear with their big, baggy eyes. But when Matt and Chris showed us the concept art, the paradigm in my head shifted 180 degrees. What they had come up with were hulking, mechanically infused beasts with one purpose in the world: to grind everything in their path to dust! And those hulks of destruction would be flanked by an army of moles serving as beasts of burden, outfitted with various devices to aid the Uprising in the enslavement of the human race. Needless to say, this was a concept I was able to get behind.

The first of these deep-earth monsters is Drillcon-Vorionnik, who is pretty straightforward, with Burrow, Riled and blue Dig In. He has one other ability that sets him apart from every other monster in Monsterpocalypse, though: Multi-Shot on the brawl. Where Drillcon’s left and right hands should be, he sports a pair of drills tipped with drilling blasters. These continually firing drill tips allow him to make ranged attacks after his brawl attacks. By taking the fight to your opponent’s side of the map and focusing those Multi-Shot attacks against enemy units, you are able to deny your opponent the ability to secure buildings and hold power zones, while laying some damage on the enemy monster with the brawl attacks. And while putting damage on your opponent and destroying his units, you are amassing more and more power dice! When Drillcon-Vorionnik shifts to his ultra form, he maintains the same strategy but picks up Weapon Master on his brawl to add to the carnage. By using those extra power dice to supplement your action dice, you can take additional monster activations, which allows those 1–2 point brawl attacks to add up until the opportunity for a well-placed power attack becomes available for the kill.

The other debut monster, Grindix-Birvikaan, is another prime brawler. On his left hand, this rock-crushing titan features a nasty-looking rotary blade (Lightning Attack), while his right has an energized drill (Power Drain). Team these with Synchronized Move on the brawl, and this alpha form is putting on the hurt. But his ultra form has something all-new for his enemies: Grind!

• GRIND—Move 2 A-Dice from the dice in play to your inactive pool. Then move 2 B-Dice and 2 P-Dice from the dice in play to your dice well. If the dice in play include at least 1 remaining A-Die, roll another attack of the same type against the same target monster with the remaining dice in play.

This nasty bit of work represents Grindix pushing his drill or saw blade into his opponent and continuing to hold it there until the tool stalls out (just think back to one of those underpowered power drill experiences you may have). With a Brawl of 8, this means Grindix could possibly make four attacks against the same target in the turn. Sometimes those third and fourth attacks may require a bit of luck, but it will be worth it if it works, as Ultra Grindix also has Energy Sap on the brawl. That will put an end to those back-to-back monster activations your opponent keeps pulling off! The trick to the big Grind is to start the attack with the biggest dice pool possible, which means getting 10 power dice into your power pool.

For those of you looking for some brawling units, this is your faction. The core unit for Subterran Uprising is the Mollok Brute (5 Speed, 4 Defense, 1★1 Brawl, and Jump) but what makes this little guy “the action” is the figures that can work with it. These include the Mollok Berserker (5 Speed, 3 Defense, 2★1 Brawl, Rage, Riled, red Berserk, and Jump) or the elite Mollok Brute (5 Speed, 4 Defense, 1★2 Brawl, Leadership, Champion, and Jump).

• CHAMPION—This unit gains +1 brawl and blast B-Dice for each adjacent grunt unit with the same name as this unit.

When these units are all placed next to one another, they can make some powerful combined attacks (though if you get too many guys bunched up they become rampage bait, so gather at your own risk). And if all that doesn’t get you ready to make a brawl attack with your units, there is also the Groundbreaker (6 Speed, 2 Defense, 2 Brawl, red Pathfinder, Flank, and Burrow). A little Flank bonus always motivates me to make a brawl attack! Not to mention, that red Pathfinder comes in handy when your opponent is hiding his monster behind a screen of units.

• PATHFINDER—Roll the A-Die used to pay for this action. If you roll 1 or more strikes, crush 1 enemy unit within 2 spaces of this figure. Do not gain a P-Die for crushing it. If you crush a unit with this ability, advance this figure up to 2 spaces even if it has advanced this turn.

The aforementioned units offer the Lords of Cthul some more in–your-face combat options. Everyone can agree that when dealing with the tentacled ones you need to keep the pressure on or else they will regain all the health you worked so hard to chip away from them. By amassing a force of Mollok Brutes with their elites and the Mollok Berserkers, you can make your opponent take notice of your units—and the more attention he pays to your units the less he can pay to your monster, giving you more time to heal. The Cthul units can benefit the Subterran monsters as well. Meat Slaves are great for players looking to hold objectives, while the elite Corrupter offers both monsters Overload on the brawl—look out, Mega Gorghadra! Spitters—especially elite Spitters, with their red Radar—work well with the Mollok Mortars in providing some ranged attack support.

When coming up with the new Fiends of Monsterpocalypse, we were looking for something that would contrast well with the Lords of Cthul. Subterran Uprising accomplishes that goal, not only in visuals and story, but also in play style. Whereas the Lords of Cthul are subtle in the guile of their tactics, the Uprising has more of a “bar-brawling, never-back-away” style of play, which actually rounds out the agenda rather nicely.

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